The clocks have been wound back an hour and Winter has officially begun to take hold. Around this time of year the ancient Celts marked the arrival of darker days with the Samhain festival, which included a number of rituals to ward off evil spirits thought to roam our lands. One such ritual was to don costumes to confuse the wandering spirits on Oíche Shamhna, a night which has since become known as Halloween. Irish famine emigrants of the 1840s brought with them to America this ancient tradition and it soon became commercialised.